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From the Townsend Letter
January 2007

 

Three Years of HCl Therapy (Part II)
as recorded in The Medical World
with introduction by Henry Pleasants, Jr., AB, MD, FaCP (Associate Editor)
Originally published by W. Roy Huntsman, Philadelphia, PA



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Relation of Iron to Neoplastic Disease
It is axiomatic that a healthy organism in either the vegetable or animal world is primarily dependent upon a normal balanced mineral content. Therefore, an excess or a deficiency must inevitably bring about, sooner or later, conditions known as disease. That the abnormal mineral content will likewise cause the affected organism to be less able to withstand encroachment of microbic life is likewise a truism.

The writer wishes to present some interesting data, linking up both the vegetable and animal worlds and showing, by proven statistics, how certain mineral deficiencies cause disease conditions and how this knowledge applied to neoplastic and affiliated diseases in the human kingdom throws a flood of light upon this darkened area of human knowledge. This data should also illustrate how, when this truth discovered in the vegetable world is applied to cases of cancerous disease, the symptoms of mineral deficiency can be greatly mitigated and curative results become strikingly manifest.

About twelve years ago, east of the Mississippi River, corn plants began to die, their stalks were stunted, molds grew on ears and roots, and farmers were in despair. The sweet corn canning industry was also involved, for black specks would appear in the canned corn, to the disgust of good housewives and the dismay of the canners when this product was returned to the canning factories. Expert chemists examined these black specks and pronounced them precipitated iron particles.

But how did iron get into the corn and why did these corn plants' roots and ears develop unsightly molds such as the rhizopus, gibberella, fusarium, etc.? George Hoffer, with the help of others, finally put the puzzle together. Taking ears of corn and using the well-known thiocyanate test, he found iron – first, in the grains of corn, before canning; next, in the joints of corn, where it had blocked the channels for sap. He also discovered that a weak solution of iron slowly injected into a growing corn plant caused these diseased conditions to appear. By using the methylene blue stain, he noted that the circulation of sap had been almost completely blocked by these iron deposits. At last, after much research, it was found that when potassium salts were applied to the soil, these disease phenomena were controlled, and the various molds likewise were no longer found on roots and ears. Again, potassium salts increased production 200% to 300% in potassium-deficient soils.

Can we show that potassium deficiency may be present in animal bodies and, like in corn, this deficiency may cause profound changes in their metabolic life? Professor A. K. Austins says that: "Potash salts are believed to be absolutely necessary for the sustenance of life." Again, Professor R. A. Hatcher2 says: "It is only within recent times that we have come to understand the importance of extremely small amounts of certain salts of the blood and the influence exerted by even slight changes in its composition. Small amounts of potassium are essential for the heartbeat, etc." Of late, we hear of iron precipitation into kidney and other organs, as in pernicious anemia, and if this precipitation of metallic iron can be shown to be the cause of the indurated tumors, malignant and benign neoplastic growths, a great step forward can be taken toward ultimate victory over neoplastic malignant disease.

But what test can demonstrate potassium deficiency in human tissues? There is a more or less accurate test for this deficiency in soils. Yet, after all is said and done, the only real proof is a pragmatic one – namely, what effect does the administration of certain potassium salts have in cases of cancerous disease? Can we show, as in corn production, that this metal does the same to human bodies as it does to growth of this cereal? Does the administration of potassium salts soften indurated cancer tissue, pick up again precipitated iron and cause a decisive increase of hemoglobin in anemic blood, cause tumors to reduce in size, and bring health and life back to cancer victims? If so, what great possibilities are in sight! For, by simply adding a potassium salt to daily intake of sodium chloride all the varied aspects (and they are many) of this deficiency may be prevented and controlled. As, however, this thesis is devoted to cancer warfare, mention of other disease conditions will be left for some future papers.

What evidence have we that, like as in cases of iron precipitation in corn, shutting off the circulation of sap through the nodes of the plants, in man a blocking of the lymph nodes can be likewise present and cause the phenomena we term neoplasms? First of all, I will quote from a letter from Professor W. W. Keen to W. Sampson Handley, MD, surgeon to Middlesex Hospital, London1: "I have just read your very interesting address on 'Lymph Stasis the Precursor of Cancer.' It appeals to me as the most reasonable and almost certain paper on the origin of cancer that I have ever seen. All others are guesswork. Here is a series of facts, observations which cannot be disputed . . . . Whether we can do anything to prevent or remedy the stasis of lymph or not is the next question. If we can, we can possibly prevent cancer."

Again, in the same article,1 Dr. Handley states: "In remarkable accord with the view that lymph stasis is the greatest general physiological factor which lays the foundation of cancer, is the flood of evidence coming from many quarters that papilloma or adenoma is the precursor of carcinoma of every variety…If, as I maintain, the papilloma or papillary adenoma is the characteristic product of local lymphatic obstruction, we are getting near to the conclusion that all carcinomas are the result of local lymphatic obstruction."

That an excess of one group of minerals and a deficiency of another may seriously disturb the delicate pH chemical balance is easily understood. And the understanding that this chemical imbalance is present in cancerous disease has been almost universally accepted by the scientific medical authorities. The late Dr. Willy Meyer, of New York City, wrote: "Exact pH measurements have revealed the fact, as shown by the literature, that malignancy is always associated with a high degree of alkalosis, and it has also been shown that the alkalosis precedes the malignancy. There can be alkalosis without malignancy, but it would seem that there can be no malignancy without alkalosis. The more virulent the malignancy, the stronger must be the alkalosis which sustains it."

Calcium, magnesium, and sodium are seemingly in excess in alkalosis of the body. In the earth, calcium, phosphorus, and magnesium are recommended for acid soils. Yet potassium is rarely in excess in such soils, but usually deficient, and when corn is destroyed or injured by precipitation of iron into the nodes, roots, ears, and leaves of the plant, we always find a deficiency of potassium salts. Likewise, in this potassium deficiency disease of corn, we find reported that many varieties of molds attack ears and roots. Does this fact not remind us of the varied microorganisms that are found in all advanced cases of malignant growths and reported by so many research workers.

During the past years, a potassium salt solution has been given to quite a few cases of cancer with striking curative results. Since giving potassium salts in a solution of hydrochloric acid of about two percent, results are so striking that the before-mentioned claim of result of precipitated iron must be as true in man as in corn, for in as short a space of time as four weeks in a woman of 42 years, the writer has seen indurated masses disappear, circulation of the arm restored, infiltrated lung by metastatic growths clear up, blood index rise, strength, color and appetite return, pain relieved, and a large hole in the right breast under simple germicidal application fill in rapidly with healthy tissue. Also, involvement of spine with pain in spine and intercostal nerves was entirely relieved.

A striking case of keratosis treated in Takoma Park, Maryland, was that of a woman who had a horny mass on the heel of one foot for over eighteen years. This growth would crack, ulcerate, and break away, then another growth would take its place. Six weeks from commencing the use of potassium salt solution, the woman found the foot was well and skin was normal. This case is especially interesting, showing, as it does, how a potassium deficiency may be present for many years. The case also opens up new thought for treatment of not only keratosis, but psoriasis and similar affections, for in keratosis, we have a condition closely allied to epithelioma.

In the city of Jacksonville, Florida, there is a woman about 70 years of age who several years before had her right breast removed and axilla cleaned out for cancerous growth. Last spring, the writer examined her and found several large hard, recurrent growths on the border of the axilla and in the ribs. The potassium and hydrochloric acid solution was prescribed. At this date, all these recurrent growths have disappeared, and her general health is greatly improved.

Repeated cases have proved that the acid potassium solution changes back to normal the gastric secretion and impaired digestion. The past four years of economic distress and financial worry are already bringing a harvest of degenerative disease, including cancer in all its manifold phenomena. And because of this great demand for relief, the writer puts out this information, instead of piling up conclusive proofs for several years so that others, if they so desire, may use this form of treatment, so inexpensive and yet so successful in this writer's hands.

What proof is there of the claim that iron is precipitated into lymph channels, blocking the affected areas from the lymph circulation and nerve control of cell life, and that these blocked lymph areas become a fruitful field for microorganisms of varied nature and kind to infect these occluded tissues. A most suggestive fact repeated over and over again is that, in advanced cases of cancerous disease, the hemoglobin color index is invariably low – 40% to 50% on the color chart. After such cases have been treated a week or two, even when no iron is administered, the color index is found to have risen to 70% or 80%. This indicates, the author believes, that the red cells of blood have taken up the precipitated iron which they had lost by the potassium deficiency. This phenomenon throws new light on the various anemias of blood so hard and unsatisfactory to treat, and also on the solution of the problem, for if iron is precipitated into the tissues, it seemingly must have been lost by the hemoglobin of the red corpuscles, and, if the hemoglobin regain it, this engorged tissue should be dissipated. This is exactly the phenomenon that occurs when HCl and potassium are taken (or better) into the bloodstream. The cancerous indurated growths often then disappear, and the hemoglobin color index rises nearer to the normal.

Various means have been employed to combat alkalosis, most futile, others quite injurious. In soils, calcium is applied to combat acidosis and, when given to cancer cases by the author, has proved most disastrous. Magnesium salts likewise. The hydrochloric acid solution with potassium salts, by vein and mouth, however, is most effective. The ammoniacal urine present in advanced cancer soon becomes acid, accompanying the dissolution of swollen lymph nodes and improvement of blood, etc.

The addition of hydrochloric acid to the body increases the available chlorine, with its marked antiseptic and phagocytic properties. HCl also helps to restore the normal pH of the tissues. Starvation also tends to correct alkalosis, but it cannot do much to relieve accompanying toxemia. Loss of blood likewise also helps greatly, in the writer's experience, in removing excess of iron, and many report themselves improved in health after losing blood from hemorrhoids, kidneys, liver, etc.

1. Cancer contributions. Adair.


Next month, Part III of "Three Years of HCl Therapy" continues the discussion of cancer with "Treatment of Cancer."

Page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7


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